


Messenger

by olliolli_oxenfree



Series: dapolyweek [5]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Chantry Issues, F/M, M/M, Multi, Satinalia, i'm still ready to fight anyone who says there's nothing wrong with cullen's attraction, stop me if you've heard this one:, this takes place sometime after jowan and lily have started their relationship, tho she's not mentioned by name technically, three agnostics attend church
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-31
Updated: 2016-10-31
Packaged: 2018-08-28 02:44:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,195
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8428405
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/olliolli_oxenfree/pseuds/olliolli_oxenfree
Summary: Day five of DA Poly Week:Happy Name-Day and Merry Satinalia!Really this is a headcanon fic about how Caedan keeps in touch with his family during DA:I. Still set before his Harrowing, though.It takes place over the holiday so it technically fits the theme.





	

The Tranquil were the ones to discover the enchantment. By drawing a sigil on their parchment before writing their thoughts, a mage could transform the paper into a messenger bird that would speak the contents of the page aloud to its recipient. In Tranquil hands the resulting birds were small and translucent, with voices that spoke in monotone. As with all enchantments, they were different when the mages performed them.

Birds varied in size and shape, though they never got much larger than a seven-inch wing span. The colors were different, too, the exact species depending on which mage drew the sigil. When these birds spoke it was with the voice of their mage. The mages were also the ones to discover how to enchant the birds so they would not speak their message unless the receiving mage felt it appropriate to do so. Mostly, this was used to avoid Templars overhearing private correspondence.

Not that the knights didn’t know of the enchantment. In a tower with no windows and only one door it would be impossible not to know of the messenger birds. The enchantment had been refined some decades before Caedan had even been born, and by the time he was brought to Ferelden the politics of the system had been worked out. Officially, Templars allowed the use of the messengers by the Senior Enchanters and their protégés. Everyone else used them regardless.

“You start with the base symbol here and then add a glyph. Yes, just so.” Caedan glimpsed at the Templar stationed within Irving’s study. Irving absolutely knew, he couldn’t _not_ know, that most of the apprentices had already mastered the sending charm. It was possible the Templar knew as well. Enough birds flitted about the library for anyone with a grasp of numbers to doubt it was only the Senior Enchanters sending them. The one thing he disliked about being taken under Irving’s wing was being caught up in the Circle's politics by proxy.

“Now, you wait for the ink to dry. Since it’s in the center of the parchment, you may start writing and let it dry as you go. Some mages prefer to avoid the enchantment entirely and write around it. I have noticed no difference in the quality of the spell if you decide to write over the sigil instead. Should you write over another’s sigil, or should they write over yours, the resulting bird will either look like their bird and speak with your voice, or vise versa.”

He’d learned that already, too. More often than not it was Surana’s voice coming from Jowan’s cowbird, or Jowan’s voice from Surana’s bluethroat. Though he wasn’t around to hear them, he also knew his voice had just as often spoken from them as well, just as theirs had come from his wood thrush.

“That is all for today’s lesson.” Short, but there was no real need to teach him this. “Keep this first one so you may have a reference. Practice as much as you like, but try not to keep them lying around.” Not often, but enough it was a concern, a Templar might coerce another mage into framing someone as being a maleficar. Even if it was a different voice, it didn’t change the fact it was a certain someone’s bird who had delivered the message. “You may stay and conduct your own research, if you like.”

“Thank you, First Enchanter, but I’ve left some notes in the library.”

“Of course.”

Caedan gathered his books and inkwells into his arms and dashed down the stairs. There were only a few hours left until the afternoon meal. While he usually wouldn’t mind spending them nestled in the corner of Irving’s study, he _did_ have some notes to finish. That, and Knight-Commander Greagoir was due to make his daily visit with Irving soon. The fewer of _those_ he attended, the happier he’d be.

At the bottom of the staircase he skirted Senior Enchanter Uldred with a muttered, “Pardon me,” and slipped inside the closing door. Jowan was hard to spot in a crowd, but even when she was sitting down Surana’s white hair was easy to find. He was halfway to her when he heard someone hiss his name. Jowan waved him over to a shelf urgently.

“Look at this!” he shoved a quill-thin book under Caedan’s nose. Caedan pushed it back to ponder the cover. It had no words on the front or the spine, and was a familiar dark green color. The shade of leaves during the summer, though it took him a while to place it. He flipped it open to discover it was about the practice of blood magic.

“Well,” he said finally, giving it back to Jowan, “don’t go learning without me.” Jowan returned his grin with a chuckle and reshelved the text to pull down a thicker manual on healing spells. For Surana, then. Caedan followed Jowan to where she sat muttering over her notes and curling a spell between her fingers. On the way he cast a surreptitious glance over his shoulder. He hadn’t _entirely_ been joking…

“You’re here early,” Surana’s spell dissipated as she slid over to make more room on the bench.

Caedan shrugged. “Wasn’t that much to teach,” he admitted, taking a seat between the two. “Unless…” he looked around carefully before drawing them closer. “Did you know you can send a message via _bird_?”

Surana pushed his shoulder. “ _You._ Don’t joke like that. A Templar might think you’re serious.” Regardless, there was a smile on her lips.

“Look!” Jowan exclaimed in hushed tones. He grabbed Caedan’s other arm and pointed excitedly. “There’s one now!” Sure enough, a sparrow flitted overhead to land on an enchanter’s shoulder. Surana giggled helplessly.

“There she is! Go tell her!”

“ _I_ don’t want to tell anyone _that_!”

“Are you a mage, or aren’t you?”

The three looked over to a group of nearby apprentices. They kept their voices low as they argued amongst themselves, but they were definitely glancing in _their_ direction.

“I think they mean you,” Jowan whispered to Surana. “They did the same thing when you came down from your lesson.”

“What did _I_ do?”

Looked like it wouldn’t be long to find out. One separated herself from the group with a hissed, “ _Honestly!_ ” and strode to their table. She looked apologetic for a moment before straightening her stance to announce, “Cullen’s in love with you.”

* * *

A Templar. What had she done to deserve a _Templar_? Wasn’t it enough the Chantry considered her magic a curse and her very self a sin?

“That’s him?” Amell asked when she finally found the knight to point him out. He sounded skeptical, unimpressed by the youthful countenance and ill-fitting armor. Surana had thought the same when first introduced to the recruit. The Templar who usually stood guard over her lessons with Wynne had been transferred to…somewhere, and Cullen had taken over his post. She’d never even said a damn _word_ to him.

“He’s easy enough to avoid,” she mumbled.

“Except every day when you go see Senior Enchanter Wynne.” There was really nothing to say to that.

“Maybe you can talk to her,” Jowan suggested in spite of the hopeless twinge in his voice. “The Templars respect her as much as they _can_ respect one of us.”

It proved difficult to do, with Cullen standing so near every lesson. Finally she was able to scrawl her predicament on one of her papers for Wynne to read. “I’m sorry, dear,” Wynne’s kingbird told her in the apprentice dorms. “Nothing more can be done without arousing suspicion.” A little suspicion might not be a _bad_ thing, Surana thought. Things did improve some, though. Wynne came to meet her for their private lessons, and walked her back afterwards. Surana also started seeing more of the knight Bran around. Kind for a Templar, in that he was one of the few to disprove of _and_ speak against Templars who sought mages.

Her biggest worry was that Satinalia was coming. One of the few choices given to the mages was how often they attended Chantry services in the chapel. During Satinalia that privilege was revoked and they would all be crammed into the walls for liturgy over the week leading to the celebration. There were too many mages for them all to fit at once so they were divided between morning and evening services; only on Satinalia proper would they all be in the chapel for a full day. “The Gallows are more adherent,” Amell had told Surana and Jowan his first year in the tower. “We sing the Chant the entire week before, and then on Satinalia the apprentices stay for our service while the mages get to go to Kirkwall’s Chantry and hear the grand cleric give her sermon. Then it’s another week of the Chant.”

Neither of them needed to ask _which_ part of the Chant. There was only one Canticle mages needed to concern themselves with. “Magic exists to serve man, and never to rule over him,” the sister delivering the passage this morning had a voice that carried well. “Foul and corrupt are they who have taken His gift and turned it against His children.”

 _They shall be named Maleficar, accursed ones._ Surana’s mind intoned dutifully. _They shall find no rest in this world or beyond._ Her knees ached from kneeling on the stone so long. It was nearly time for the midday meal. Most the apprentices had grown restless. She spied Amell further down her row, head bent but eyes unfocused as his mind went someplace else. Jowan was a few spots behind him and nearer to her, paying attention to the sister reciting the Chant. That struck her as odd. Then she saw Cullen turn his face in her direction and she returned to scrutinizing the ground.

A hundred voices speaking, “Foul and corrupt are you who have taken My gift and turned it against My children,” signaled the end of the service. Surana waited for the crowd to thin. There was little use in pushing to be first out the door when the dining hall would be just as packed. Amell and Jowan waded toward her through the throng.

“I can never tell if morning or afternoon services are worse,” Amell grumbled, moving his arms to pop his back.

“Afternoon.” Jowan said firmly. “You spend all day dreading them. If the sisters like, they can go on _forever_.” Amell hummed in agreement. Their speaking of the Chant at least had to be done in time for lunch. Since mages attended as well as apprentices, evening services did not need to stop for their lights-out.

The sister who spoke the passage stopped near them. An initiate, Surana realized. Some of the detailing a sister of the Chantry would wear was absent on her robes. “Did you enjoy the service?”

“Yes,” Jowan answered quickly. He glanced to the Templar with her and added, “You delivered the sermon well.” The initiate smiled. Light caught her hair, turning it from brown to red. Was this what she had imagined when she joined the Chantry? Serving the Maker by getting locked in with His hated children? She and her Templar companion left. Most of the room was cleared, and the three went to follow.

Cullen stood by the door.

Surana dropped her gaze. She might have bolted, but before she could speed her pace Amell and Jowan both wrapped an arm around her. Jowan’s went across her hips, and Amell’s her shoulder. Instead of running, she took strength from the solidarity offered by their contact. Her head lifted and shoulders straightened. She challenged Cullen by staring him dead in the eye. He said nothing.

Her courage fled in the night. Everyone attending the evening Chantry sermon had returned before lights-out and the apprentice dorm was full of snores and muted comments of what to expect from the Satinalia service the next day. A few heads turned her way when she climbed down from her bed to the floor. Amell was closer. She crossed the cold stone to his mattress. He was on his side, but not asleep. He twisted his neck to look at her when she placed a hand on his shoulder, then rolled over and scooted to the edge of the mattress so there was room. Before lying down she looked towards Jowan. A light sleeper, he was already sitting. She beckoned him with a flick of her head and joined Amell. Jowan slid in behind her.

It was a tight fit with the three of them. The narrow beds were made to fit as many apprentices in a room as possible and didn’t lend themselves to sharing. A human child alone took up half the space. Surana nestled between them, eyes level with Amell’s chest. His hand settled on her waist, and Jowan stretched a leg over hers to lock it with Amell’s. Jowan reached a hand across as well, and in the scant light given by the torches near the doors she could see his fingers fidgeting with Amell’s hair. It was a long time before any of them slept.

**Author's Note:**

> This started out as day two's entry but I had to rework it when my work schedule became hectic is it as obvious as I think it is?


End file.
